


Winter Winds

by 401



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Amnesia, Anal Sex, Anger, Anxiety, Brainwashing, Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Returns, Conditioning, Fluff, Love, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Mutual Masturbation, Oral, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protectiveness, Sex, Steve Rogers Feels
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-31
Updated: 2015-11-16
Packaged: 2018-04-29 03:17:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5114057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/401/pseuds/401
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky returns after the mission on the bridge. Steve is going to have to learn how to love The Asset before he gets to love Bucky again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Distance

**Author's Note:**

> Rated E for later smut.

The Asset stopped on the final rooftop of the block. Keeling forward with his forearms pressed to his knees he took breaths, deep ones that stung his already raw throat. Fear. It was not something he felt often but it had been creeping up lately in attacks of dread, pure unnamed dread that made his feel drunk and vulnerable, like he was naked on that rooftop staring out into the glistening molecules of the cold night. Instead he was swathed in leather and Kevlar but the wind was still unforgiving and he could hear its blistering circuits around the buildings surrounding the one that he was on. He quite liked it. After the Hydra bunker, it was a sweet contrast from the thick, sickly, ethanol-smelling heat that he was used to, like stepping out of the crowded subway in July. In the night like this, it was especially soothing.

The Asset bristled when he heard a sound that he was used to by now, the one that he had been waiting for and running from. It was the sound that had driven him to this rooftop and that had made that bastard fear drag its sorry ass through his veins in the first place; the motor of a 1940’s refurb Harley Davidson, and the hoarse but tuneful humming of its driver.

The Asset sighed and extended his metal side in front of him, stretching the mechanised fingers and folding them, one by one back towards himself. The movements were losing their tune, the arm needed maintenance or at least lubrication, but it could wait.

_Yeah, like your three broken ribs, busted rotator cuff and countless strain injuries._

The Asset frowned away his thoughts and focused on shifting his trajectory, sitting on the edge of the building and looking down at the tall blonde with the noisy motorbike as he packed away his helmet and flipped that shield onto his back with a practised movement. The Asset’s hand twitched against the small tactical machine pistol at his hip, the only weapon still serviceable in his arsenal. He had a beautiful mark on the Captain, back of the head, no margin and not too messy (the ammo in the TMP was small, no splatter) and he questioned why he didn’t just go for it.

He played it out in his head. Gloves. Switch. Line-up. Switch. Affirm mark. Switch. Trigger. Switch. Done. It was faultless, faultless at least until he pictured the familiar form in front of him dropping to his knees in a spray of skull fragments and tissue. He could hear he shield clattering to the ground in his head, rolling on its edges like a thrown penny before clunking to a halt. For once, it made his skin crawl, repulsed him like no mark ever had and made his stomach drop a foot. It made his eyes sting with tears he had no practise in wiping away, to think that he would never watch this ‘Steve Rogers’ like he had every day since the mission. Little things, walking around in sweats, burning himself whilst cooking, sneezing, wiping his eyes when he was tired, buying eggs and orange juice (with pulp) and going about life in a way that was level, consistent. In a way that made The Asset so sure that he existed, that he was real.

He felt a little shame in watching Steve like this. The Captain had cried, a lot in the days after the mission on the bridge. The tears has turned to messy anger, the kind that resulted in busted walls, sprained wrists and rubbed red noses. Screams into pillows.

_Stevie, darlin’ calm down._

The invasive memory had made The Asset reel. The images of a happier time had bought him to his knees and spun him in a cloud of pictures till he gagged. That was when he had known, really known that he remembered that man, when he realised that he _cared_ about him. That he watched the grown man sleep just to make sure he was resting and that he would vault down to his window to close it to make sure he didn’t get a chill, or follow him to the grocery store to make sure he was safe. It was illogical. But that is what caring was, looking after someone who could look after themselves just fine.

As much as it made The Asset’s life easier, the distance hurt him. The two storey gap between them was beginning to feel far too wide and he felt it was time to close it.

He swung forward onto the empty sidewalk outside the apartment block away from the main entrance, breaking his fall on well bent knees. Steve’s window was a jump away. He chanced it, landing with his palms on the ledge. He hoisted himself up and rolled through the open window, falling almost silently into the room, feeling carpet between his fingers. Steve would up in minutes. The Asset got to his feet and look around the apartment. Blues and browns, soft and inoffensive. It smelled of cologne and wooden furniture, and a little like paint so Steve could not have been here long. On the mantle, there was a model motorbike, just like the one he rode, a mirror and a photograph.

It was a black and white one of a man. He was in a military uniform, smiling and saluting. There was a laugh at the edge of the smile. The Asset’s eyes flicked from the photograph to the mirror and immediately wished that they hadn’t. He looked at his reflection in comparison. His hair was longer, he had stubble too. Older maybe? Or just tired. The Asset frowned before moving his mouth like the man in the picture, showing his teeth and crinkling his eyes. As the realisation dawned and the resemblance bloomed, the smile became less unnatural.

“Checking yourself out, Buck?” The voice from behind him startled him.

Steve was standing there, a lopsided smile that The Asset could see started out as a grimace of shock was painted across his face. There were two grocery bags on the floor next to him, apples rolling around his feet. His voice was thin and shaky.

“You left your window open,” Bucky whispered, “You shouldn’t do that.”

Steve chuckled and scooped up the groceries on the floor.

“I had to,” Steve shrugged, “How else would you get in?”


	2. Bucky

“Sit down,” Steve’s voice was firm, comfortingly final and commanding.

The Asset obeyed, slowly easing himself into the armchair closest to him. He let his flesh fingers graze the fabric slowly and absently but kept his metal ones closed and tight to his chest. The Captain sighed and sat opposite, raking his hands over a face that was much more strained than the last time The Asset had seen it.

“I can’t believe you actually came,” Steve muttered, half to himself, a face of shock and incredulity pointed at the carpet between his feet, “It was starting to seem like wishful thinking.”

The Asset sat silently, unsure of what he could say or do to make this situation any less daunting for either of them. He looked at the Captain, sitting there with his elbows on his knees and his hands clasped in front of him like a silent prayer for words. His knuckles were calloused and used-looking; a puncher not a shooter, and they did not match the gentle movements they made, like they were used to much more room to move, space to function in. The Asset liked that, the gentleness. It was not something that he was personally blessed with.

“I’ve been watching you,” The Asset said, immediately wincing at how the admission sounded, “I wanted to make sure you…”

The Asset let his voice trail off into tense silence.

“Go on,” Steve encouraged.

The Asset sighed, wringing his mismatched hands together before relaxing them, hearing the titanium joints scrape much louder than usual on his left side.

“I wanted to make sure you didn’t disappear again,” The Asset said quietly, almost a whisper, “This is the longest I have remembered anything for.”

Steve felt like an aching pressure behind his nose. He ignored the filling of his eyes and crossed the room, sitting on the couch next to The Asset rather than the armchair that he was already in. The Asset winced slightly at the closeness but relaxed quickly when Steve looked down, slicing the eye contact.

“Bucky, I…” Steve pressed his lips into a line, at a loss for words, “I have missed you so much.”

The asset fixed on the usage of his old name. It glowed in his head, like a fragment of a dream when you have woken up that sits too far back on your tongue to reach. He swallowed deeply, feeling the hair on his flesh arm stand up.

“You’re important, Steve Rogers,” The Asset frowned into the floor, “I have never tried to kill someone as many times as you without success, and it’s nothing to do with that shield.”

Steve huffed a laugh but stopped himself when he saw that The Asset’s face had not changed at all.

“I care too much,” The Asset continued, anxiety creeping through his chest, “I actually want you alive.”

Steve nodded, reaching over to place his hand on top of Bucky’s metal one. He shifted it away swiftly so Steve let his rest on the arm of the chair instead.

“Well,” Steve cleared his throat, “I want you alive too, very much so.”

The Asset nodded slowly and let his head rest against the back of the chair. The room was quiet. The small sounds, like the heaters kicking on and off and the police sirens from the street were not a nuisance but a comfort. The lighting was low, but enough that the two soldiers could see each other clearly without jarring brightness.

Time had passed by the time The Asset noticed his thoughts slowly starting to make less sense, sounds were dulling and Steve’s movements around him were fading into a lull in his attention. He was falling asleep. The Asset forced his eyes open and got to his feet, stumbling a little.

“Go back to sleep, Bucky,” The Captain smiled.

Bucky nodded and sat back down, letting his eyes drift again.

Bucky. He played it again in his head.

It sounded good.


	3. Never Again

_“Stop calling me that,” Bucky’s voice was carried off by the movement in the basement around him. He was strapped to a brick red gurney, the room smelled like surgical spirit and vomit, a sour haze of juxtaposed clean and dirty smells. His head pounded, the sedatives that had been pumped into him wearing off far too quickly. There was a small, greasy looking man in a chair next to him._

_The man’s legs were crossed, reclined nonchalantly as he took lazy-handed notes on a pad of yellow paper. There was a small voice recorder next to him._

_“The Asset seems disorientated,” the man stated to the recorder as he wrote, “Maintains memory of erased counter-identity; requires further cleansing._

_Bucky’s legs tightened immediately. He knew what ‘cleansing’, and the memory of it brought him no pleasure. Images of that machine flashed through his head like static on a monitor. The frantic buzzing of electricity blew his eardrums, deafening him every time. But he healed. That was the sick part of this. Bucky wished that the first time blood had leaked from his ears and words had turned to warped mumbles, they would have regarded him as useless. He would rather be deaf, but the serum made him repair the damage they did, so they got to keep doing it._

_The greasy man struck a hard slap across Bucky’s cheek._

_“Up,” The man ordered._

_Bucky felt a twinge of anxiety in his gut and obeyed, letting the handler untie him and push him roughly across the concrete basement._

_He sat in the machine, and closed his eyes as the orderly jittered around the hulking grey apparatus like flies on a corpse. There was a loud click of locking restraints and the humming began, intensifying slowly until it started to crackle around his ears and make the hair on his arms stand. The throbbing in his temples started, growing to a burning until the soldier could not hold back the scream rising in his throat, aching his lungs and making him dizzy. Bucky lay helplessly as he watched his thoughts dissipate like ink in water. He gripped onto them with numb hands feeling them slip through his fingers._

_Then there was silence and darkness. Unutterable darkness. The Asset lay immobile on the odd metal bench and wondered where he was._

“Bucky, it’s me,” Steve put a cautious hand on the soldier’s forehead, “C’mon, just try and wake up.”

The noise had been enough to bring Steve into a run as he had come into his living room. Bucky had been silent all night, barely moving in his sleep and maintaining the same position every time Steve had checked on him (too many times).

Bucky’s metal fingers gripped Steve’s wrist and closed around it. His voice was coming in tight airless sobs. His head was tossing, not quickly but searchingly, like he was stopping himself sinking. His right hand found Steve’s throat and clenched tight like his left. Steve coughed and thanked God that it was Bucky’s flesh hand, linking his fingers with Bucky’s and moving his hand up and pressing it against the side of his head instead of his neck.

“Shh,” Steve soothed, watching the rise and fall of Bucky’s chest slow to a more comfortable pace as his flesh fingers knotted in Steve’s hair.

Steve eased himself onto the floor next to the couch.

“I don’t want to lose you again,” Bucky’s voice was hoarse and messy, cloudy with sleep, “They’re making me lose you again.”

Steve frowned, rubbing circles in the sleeping soldier’s palm.

“No, never again,” Steve reassured, “I’m right here, never again.”

 


	4. Toast

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> let mad fluff ensue

“You know,”

Steve pointed at Bucky’s untouched plate from across the table,

“You’re taking ‘eating with your eyes’ to a whole new level.”

Bucky looked down at his toast. It should have been easy, all one colour, all one texture and all one flavour. But it daunted him, because Bucky had _chosen_ toast.

If Steve had said ‘I am making toast and you are going to eat some’ it would have been easy. The instructions were clear, the outcome was plain. But instead, Steve had asked Bucky what he wanted for breakfast and Bucky had stood there like a rabbit in a wolf cage trying to remember what the fuck breakfast consisted of. He had looked at the bread on the counter and whispered ‘toast’.

“Please try and eat it, Buck”

Steve shuffled his chair over to Bucky’s side,

“I’ve got other things in the fridge, ore we can go to the store.”

Bucky shook his head.

“I…” Bucky’s chest seized with anxiety, “I’m not hungry.”

He braced himself for a punishment, turning his cheek so that the incoming slap would not break his nose and he anchored his hands on the seat of the chair.

“Oh, alright,” Steve shrugged, putting the plate on the side.

Bucky remained braced.

“Let me know if you are,” he chimed, rubbing Bucky’s shoulder amiably,

“It is probably gonna take you some time to get used to eating regularly.”

That was it. Steve sat down on the couch and flicked on the television.

“You’re not going to punish me?” Bucky stood up slowly.

Steve stood up too frowning in confusion.

“I didn’t do as you asked, and you’re not reprimanding me,” Bucky’s voice was small and still.

Steve chuckled, crossing the space between them and putting his hands in Bucky’s hips, bending his knees so he could see his face.

“Of course not,” Steve coughed out, “Buck, it’s toast.”

“But…”

“ _Toast_ , Bucky,” Steve interrupted, “Not gonna get put out over toast.”

Bucky nodded. Steve rubbed Bucky’s shoulders again, slow circular movements over his collarbones that seem to radiate down both arms like warm water through his veins. Bucky sighed, wincing as the breath shook between his lips.

“You don’t want me to stop, do you,” Steve chuckled, nudging Bucky’s forehead with his.

Bucky shook his head and leaned forward, pressing his nose and mouth into the crook of Steve’s neck, ignoring the hammering in his chest that was telling him to run a mile, back out into the frigid solitude the DC winter.

“Buck?” Steve wrapped his arms around the soldier properly and squeezed him a little closer.

“Mm,” Bucky gripped tighter too, painfully so with his metal hand. Steve ignored it.

“This is your first hug since 1944,” Steve smiled. Bucky nodded into Steve’s neck, pressing himself impossibly tight against the Captain, until Steve’s hipbones ached with the pressure.

“And you’re okay?” Steve smoothed the back of the soldier’s hair with a warm, strong hand.

Bucky froze. He was okay, very okay. The most okay he had been for as long as he could remember. Every inch of his body was burning with this invisible pulse the centred in his stomach and made his ears ring and it felt beautiful. It was familiar. I was Steve.

“I loved you, didn’t I?” Bucky choked.

This time Steve froze, pulling back and moving his hands to the sides of Bucky’s face.

“You did.” Steve looked dumbfounded, flushed and terrified.

“And you used to hug me like that before we went off on missions, in the forties.”

Steve nodded, flat out ignoring the tears coursing down his cheeks and the shudder in this breath.

“Yeah…yeah I did.”

Bucky looked at the floor and frowned.

“And I got upset, because you didn’t need me to look after you anymore, I needed you to watch my back.”  


Steve’s lungs turned to stone as he remembered those nights in the dull, rainy sea of piss-smelling camo tents with the Howling Commandos. When he and Bucky had to change everything, how they laid next to each other because Steve was taller than him and how they kissed because Bucky was so used to leading that Steve would sit down to give him the control

“You never told me that upset you,” Steve’s throat was dry.

Bucky nodded and pulled away a little further.

“Hey,” Steve caught him as he turned.

“Bucky, I never stopped needing you.”  


Bucky smiled. It was crooked and it made Steve’s knees weak.

“I still love you, don’t I?” Bucky looked at Steve, their eyes met fully.

Steve went to speak, no real noise came out, just a squeak of directionless air.

“I don’t know,” Steve shrugged, “Do you?”

Bucky stepped forward into Steve’s arms again and curled into the solid, hot space that he wished he had never left.

“Yeah,” Bucky nodded against Steve’s chin, “I love you.”

 

 

 


	5. For Now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> kissing

The night was a calm one. Everything Steve had been missed and everything Bucky had forgotten about. Steve taught Bucky how to play Blackjack four times before the soldier gave up and curled up on couch next to him with his arms folded around a pillow, staring contently into the warmly lit living room.

Steve watched for a moment, looking at the way Bucky absently sucked his lip in and out of his mouth with a small gnawing motion. Steve’s stomach curled and heated. Bucky’s mouth was a weakness, always had been. The way his top lip was slightly fuller than h bottom one in a way that left them gently parted at rest was inviting. There was more expression, often, in his mouth than his eyes, with his true feelings or opinions showing as a twitch of a smile or a grimace rather than in his eyes. Steve tried to pull away his gaze but found that it snapped back almost instantly.

“Are you cold?” Steve asked.

Bucky startled a little from the daydream and sat up, shaking his head in response to the question that he clearly had not heard.

“C’mere,” Steve opened his arms.

Bucky hesitated momentarily before leaning into Steve and pressing himself, as usual, into the crook of Steve’s neck.

“Properly,” Steve chuckled, guiding Bucky’s arms to his shoulders and coaxing him into a hug.

Bucky sighed into pressure as Steve stood from the couch with him, arms entangled.

“Bucky?” Steve was cautious, quiet.

“Yeah?”

Steve paused, searching through his racing thoughts to find the words he needed.

“Can I kiss you?” Steve asked outright, “Would you let me do that?”

Bucky frowned at Steve’s chest in consideration.

“Can I face the door?” Bucky asked.

Steve nodded.

“And you’ll stop if I pull away.”  


Steve nodded

“Of course, no doubt,” Steve promised, turning Bucky so he could see the door and placing his hands on the soldier’s hips.

Bucky smiled and closed his eyes.

Steve leant forwards and linked their lips together, pressing soft and warm into the contact as cool metal fingers tentatively found their way under his t-shirt. Steve pressed harder, lacing his fingers through Bucky’s hair and closing the small gap between their bodies with a careful step. He heard Bucky huff out an unstable breath into his mouth and broke the touch of their lips.

“Okay?” Steve asked, not hearing his voice over his heart.

Bucky nodded eagerly and leaned forward again, joining their lips once again.

His cheeks smouldered and his pulse was a constant rhythm throughout his whole body. Heat coiled in his stomach and the urge to kiss Steve harder pulled on him relentlessly.

“My God, Buck I’ve missed you,” Steve huffed against Bucky’s mouth passionately, gripping the soldier at the small of the back, tugging him forward until their hips pushed together firmly.

Bucky stepped back sharply, catching Steve’s wrists in mid-air, heart thumping in his chest and his breath coming in hot huffs against the Captain’s mouth, just barely touch his now.

“Steve…” Bucky closed his eyes, collecting his thoughts.

He opened them slowly, and was met with a pair of fiery, earnest blue ones that suddenly no longer terrified him to meet. They made him feel safe, not exposed. He didn’t watch that mouth to sense danger, he watched it because it thrilled him. Because it felt good. The contact was good, the first contact that did not hurt that he had felt for as long as he could remember.

“You need me to stop?” Steve brushed Bucky’s cheek with his finger.

Bucky nodded deftly, lips still so close to Steve’s that it ached not to press back into the wet, absorbing heat.

“For now,” Bucky mumbled, dumbstruck, “Not forever.”

 

 


End file.
